At the same time something splashed and she swiveled, but she could see nothing, and decided that the sound must have come from outside the cave. Backtracking, she peered out along the little stream that flowed into the cavern, through the low, dark opening. Something was rising from the stream out there. Sparkling droplets of water splashed around a long, silver-brown body energetically shaking itself dry as it rose from the water. Yana watched in fascination as the droplets flew, clearing a finely sculpted head with ears flat against the skull and bright eyes that seemed to search the entrance of the cave. Then the moisture was gone and the head seemed to, well, fluff out, she supposed, and the body lengthened into that of a man-a man who seemed to be wearing a fine silky pelt of hair. Or, perhaps, a gray wet suit. But as he walked closer to her, she saw with joyful surprise that the man was Scan, clad in nothing at all save volcanic ash, which he must have been trying to wash off in the spring before coming inside.
"You always travel that way?" she called out, not quite trusting what she thought she had seen and hoping that either he would explain sometime soon or she could somehow find a subtle way to ask.
He grinned down at her. "Not always, but it's very convenient if you know how." He looked down at himself. "Can get a little drafty once I'm out of my element, though."
The cave was littered with bits of uniform that had been discarded by survivors as not worth transporting. Scan rifled through them until he found a flight suit riddled with holes. He pulled it on, and it served as a social covering.
"Ashes as disguise and swimming as transport? Clever of you," she said, making a wild guess.
"More or less," he said, coming to stand very close to her and putting his hands on her shoulders.
She wasn't quite ready yet to be distracted by his touch, still bewildered and intrigued by the way he had appeared and by what she felt surely had to be her perfectly ridiculous perceptions of it. "You know - I was wondering about that raven that guided us here - I sort of had a sense of you then. You don't by any chance own a black wet suit and hang glider, do you?" she asked, lifting her brows in a query that practically demanded that he confide in her.
He remained amused and enigmatic. "And make myself small, as well? Gracious no, I couldn't do that. I don't go in for wings. I've a definite water affinity. But I do have friends in high places."
Yana decided to pursue that mystery later and concentrate on more urgent matters for the time being. She laid a hand on his arm and said, "Sean, I'd better brief you as to what's happening here. Torkel Fiske is ready to court-martial me for trying to defend
Petaybee and Clodagh's taken Torkel's father into the cavern-"
"I know, Yana, I know. And I'll explain as soon as there's time. Right now we'll do better to help Dr. Fiske and Clodagh."
His hand made a reassuring warm spot on the middle of her back as he guided her toward the passageway.
Yana became suddenly aware that the sound of the helicopter, which had grown faint by the time she had found Scan, was suddenly louder again. Instinctively she lengthened her stride. Sean heard it, too, and increased his pace to match hers until both were well within the passage.
The luminescence was brightening, and ahead of them she could hear Clodagh saying soothingly, "… someone who wants to meet you, Dr. Fiske."
The copter thud grew louder and louder, then suddenly began fading again, but from behind, Yana heard quick footsteps entering the cave.
"Come out with your hands up, Shongili, Maddock! I saw you rendezvous!" Torkel yelled. "And my father had better be unharmed or-"
"Are you with me?" Sean asked Yana quickly. She nodded, and they stood, one on either side of the passage, flush against the wall, while Torkel, forgetting all training in his agitation, barreled into their ambush. Yana disarmed him easily and caught him in a wristlock, while Sean, on the other side, did something that made Torkel sag against them. Other footsteps could be heard in the outer cave then, but Sean ignored them as he dragged Torkel onward. Yana stepped forward to help, and together they steered him through the passage and into the inner cave, where Clodagh, Bunny, Sinead, Nanook, and Dinah surrounded Dr. Fiske.
A warm mist was already rising from the rivulets running down the cavern walls and along the sides of the floor. It was scented with earth, ozone, plant life, both green and decaying, and the faintest hint of the perfume of exotic flowers. The mist trickled along the floor and twined up the knees of the people in the cavern, gently tugging them down.
The luminescence on the cavern walls danced with shadow play as if lit by firelight; the walls themselves seemed to pulse. The mist thickened and rolled up around them, veiling their faces: heavy, warm, scented mist; the distilled essence of the caves, the ground, the water, the air, moving in and out of their bodies with each breath they took.
Feet shuffled briefly behind Yana, and the disturbance in the air pressure told her that yet others had entered the room. They said nothing, and when she could bring herself to glance over her shoulder, she saw that the late arrivals were cloaked by the mist as well, their nostrils and mouths and lungs and hearts adding to the rhythm with which the cave pulsed.
Every sound was magnified, the trickle of the water rattling like rain on a roof or rustling leaves, a whispered accent to the measured throb in the cave.
Suddenly Torkel writhed in Yana's hands, and she felt him wake, heard his ragged breathing tear against the fabric of the thing that was happening here.
"No!" he cried. "No, stop! This is how they brainwash you. Dad, don't listen!"
Dr. Fiske's voice sounded muffled and distracted as he answered, " 'M fine. Don't be such a horse's ass."
And Clodagh murmured encouragingly, "You're both just fine, just fine."
From behind Yana, other hands joined hers on Torkel and other arms wrapped around him-in reassurance, not restraint.
"Don't fight, Captain," Diego's voice whispered. "Please don't fight. Listen. It doesn't mean to hurt you, it just wants you to listen."
"I'm here, Captain Fiske," Steve Margolies whispered in a less solicitous tone. "I'm a scientist, and so is your father. If this is all bull, we'll know. You're safe with us. Greene and the other pilot just joined us. You're safe."
"You're safe and well and here because Petaybee has much to tell the sons of those who first woke the planet to life," Clodagh said.
Torkel started to struggle again, and the whole cave suddenly vibrated with a thumping tremor that repeated over and over to the beat it had established from their breathing. The walls swirled with images, and Yana once more felt the jolt of contact running up her spine, exploding in her nervous system with blossoms of pure joy as she experienced a greater unity than she had ever known. A part of her heard Torkel gasp as he was infused with it, too, and then others became included. Contact was made with them now, each touching another; warm skin or warm cave, warm mist or warm breath, all were mingled in the heavy beat of the planet's great heart.
In the cold cave floor she felt the ice-and-rock shell that had once imprisoned that heart. Then a shock rocked through her, over and over again, the world's greatest orgasm, this world's great orgasm. She was so full of life and joy that her body could not contain it all and lovely things began growing from her skin, her hair, her eyes and mouth and ears and nose, her womb and anus and fingers and toes and hair, giving birth to thousands of new beauties every second, flowering things and furred things, winged things and hoofed things, soft dense creeping mosses and towering trees with undulating sweet-scented fronds. And through each thing, with no more than a whim of a try, she could speak and sing, act and dance, love and laugh and live. Even dying was a kind of life, and she felt that, too, with regret but no grief.